The instant application claims priority under 35 USC 119 of Japanese Patent Application No. 2000-90289 filed on Mar. 29, 2000, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus, like a facsimile, for printing received image information on a sheet of paper, and particularly relates to an apparatus that performs the printing after fulfilling the environmental condition adapted to printing operation. The present invention is also related to an image forming method employing said apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
A facsimile machine generally includes a scanning unit to scan an image of a document, a communication unit to transmit and receive image information through telephone lines or cables, and a printing unit to produce the received image information output on a sheet of paper. Like an image forming apparatus using electrophotographic process, said printing unit often employs a transfer device to transfer a toner image to a sheet of paper and a fixing device to fix it. As an electrophotographic copier does, a facsimile machine applying said electrophotographic process uses a method to form an electrostatic latent image by irradiating a photoconductive drum with light in accordance with received image information, to cause a toner to adhere onto the latent image and to transfer a toner image to paper so as to make the printing.
A copier in general is used in limited time and easily able to set the optimum operating condition through the warm-up by switching on in the morning to drive the fix units and by stopping the cooling fan. Meanwhile, since a facsimile machine frequently receives data while nobody is near around like in the night-time, it prints signals without adjusting the environmental condition such as temperature or humidity to the optimum condition for printing, and cannot secure good image quality enough. In order to clear the aforesaid problem of degraded image quality, there is given a proposal to operate the apparatus so as to adapt to the condition appropriate to print when the apparatus receives the facsimile information; however, it sometimes requires long time to secure the optimum condition or occasionally it cannot secure the optimum condition under some environmental condition.
One object of the present invention is to provide an image forming apparatus that can eliminate the above-described problems.
According to one aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image forming apparatus including a receiving unit to receive image information, a printing unit to print the image information on paper, and a memory to keep the received image information. This image forming apparatus is adapted to keep the received information in the memory if the environment condition is not optimum when it receives the image information. The apparatus sets the optimum condition by driving the apparatus for a predetermined period without printing, and print the image from the memory after that. The printing operation is effected after the optimum condition is attained so that decent printing quality is promised.
The environment condition may be temperature and/or humidity. A heater and/or a fan in the printing unit may be driven to obtain the optimum condition. The apparatus may include a display for indicating a fact that the environment condition is optimum or not.
The received image information may be retrieved from the memory and printed on a sheet if a user directs to print it. The user can direct the printing operation even prior to fulfilling the optimum condition. The use is therefore able to obtain the printed image when he or she wants it.
The received image information may be retrieved from the memory and printed after the image forming apparatus is driven for a prescribed period regardless of a fact that the optimum condition is reached or not. By doing so, it is possible to prevent the received image information from being accumulated in the memory for a long period without printing.
According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an image forming method including the steps of receiving image information, accumulating the received image information in a memory, detecting an environmental condition, determining whether the detected environmental condition is an optimum one or not, driving at least one element in an apparatus for a predetermined period if the detected condition is not determined the optimum one, printing the image information accumulated in the memory after the predetermined period elapses or after the detected condition is determined the optimum one.
If a printing command is input by a user, the printing is effected regardless of the detected environment condition.
Additional objects, aspects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art to which the present invention relates from the subsequent description of the embodiment(s) and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.